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Saturday, December 22, 2018

Everything you do, be it great or small, is but one-eighth of the problem, whereas to keep one’s state of mind undisturbed even if thereby one should fail to accomplish the task, is the other seven eighths.

Facebook depresses me because everyone's life looks better than mine. I don't want to contribute to that problem by presenting a choreographed product here. You don't want to read about my heroic struggle to clear the drain in the dishwasher, but that's the kind of excitement that fills my days. At any hour of any day, you're likely to find all three of us working. That's mostly what we do. It's not a bad life, I have no complaints about it. I only mention this to avoid misleading by omission.

Max took his first training flight in an airplane on his birthday. He liked airplanes from birth. At preschool, when asked what he wanted to be when he grew up, he said, "A airplane! Wiff ten engines!"

He studied photography at his high school, and made this ad. I like the composition, but Max only says, "Yeah, I calculated you could land a plane on this street, given the right conditions."

Misa continued to make and sell jewelry, handbags and scarves at her store, LoveMisaStyle.

Work continues on my Eternal Picture. Right now I'm working out some problem areas off the main canvas. We'll see how far I get in 2019.

A Buddhist shrine enclosure hangs on the wall in my office. Elaborate rules dictate what to place inside and how this sacred space is cared for. Naturally, I ignore every one of the rules and do what I want with it.

Today I placed photographs of women who taught me important lessons. The photographs were taken over a period of one hundred years. When I stepped back and looked at them, I noticed every head was slightly tilted in the same way, and each girl beamed the same delicate smile.

Each face connects to the others, to this Earth, to the passing of time, and to me. There it is, the horizontal arc, the wider pattern we swim in. Like the curve of our planet's surface, the arc is always there, but we catch a glimpse only a few times in life.

Music this year comes from a Canadian singer, Ken Lavigne, who deserves more attention.